Early end in the DFB Cup: two first and seven second division clubs out

A new record was set when a 41,100 crowd turned up for the cup game in Cologne’s stadium. But Bayern Munich’s coach Louis van Gaal was enraged by his team’s performance. “That was the worst match of our pre-season build up,” ranted the Dutchman. Earlier on Monday (16 August), a 4-0 (2-0) win against TSV Germania Windeck had given his Bayern eleven a comfortable passage to the second round of the DFB Cup. The fifth division side from the Cologne area attracted the highest attendance for a first round match since the start of the “Deutschen Fußball-Bund’s” (German Football Association - DFB) cup competition 75 years ago. And van Gaal’s criticism of his team can also be taken as a compliment by the underdogs. Goals from Miroslav Klose, Franck Ribery, Toni Kroos und Mario Gomez meant that, in the end, Bayern moved a step closer to a successful defence of the DFB Cup. But the opening match against the amateurs turned out to be harder than anticipated. Munich, the record cup winners, appeared to be tired and uninspired. The hard pre-season training was still in their legs. And the outsiders battled valiantly. “Windeck played with a lot of discipline and they kept at it over the full 90 minutes. They were very good,” said van Gaal when praising Germania.

“We played really badly and our passing game never got going,” said a self-critical Klose. “Our effort levels were not high enough,” continued the striker who has won 101 caps for Germany. Three days before, Bayern suffered a penalty shoot-out loss to Real Madrid after a goalless 90 minutes. The 22-time league championship winners kicked off the season by overcoming runners-up Schalke to win the Super Cup in Augsburg. Van Gaal saw the cup game in Cologne as being a part of his team’s pre-season preparations even though it was a competitive match. Munich are focussing on VfL Wolfsburg who they will face in the opening game of the 2010/2011 Bundesliga season in the Allianz Arena on Friday, 20 August.

Wolfsburgwas one of the teams to have a troublesome passage into the second round. Playing fourth division Preußen Münster, a 2-1 win was just enough to see them through. 1-0 up with four minutes to go, Wolfsburg were pegged back to 1-1 before Grafite goal in the 88th minute not only sealed the win (2-1) for the Bundesliga club but also destroyed Münster’s hopes of taking the match to extra time. 2-1 was also the score on Monday in the final game of the first round when FC Schalke 04 defeated third division VfR Aalen. The performance was just as uninspiring as Bayern’s against Windeck. “What counts is that we’re in the next round,” said coach Felix Magath. However a similar performance in their first game of the Bundesliga season at Hamburger SV will not be enough.

St. Pauli and Hanover out – shocks also for five second division clubs

Other Bundesliga clubs were harder hit. Promoted FC St. Pauli and Hanover 96 were the two clubs from the top league that failed to progress. The Hamburg club lost at fourth division Chemnitzer FC 1-0. Hanover came unstuck at fourth division SV Elversberg 5-4 in the shoot-out after both teams had failed to score in 120 minutes. A total of seven clubs from the 2nd Bundesliga fell at the first hurdle. Five of them were defeated by lower league clubs. Fourth division Victoria Hamburg overcame Rot-Weiß Oberhausen 1-0, Halleschen FC won in Leipzig by the same score against Union Berlin. Three clubs from the third division, who now count as professional clubs in Germany, eliminated second division opposition from the competition. Kickers Offenbach, who are heading the league, underlined their ambitions of a return to the second division when beating VfL Bochum 3-0. TuS Koblenz, who were relegated at the end of last season, won 1-0 against Fortuna Düsseldorf. And the former second division club Eintracht Braunschweig downed SpVgg Greuther Fürth 2-1 in extra time.

The two all-second division games both ended in 2-0 home wins.FC Ingolstadt beat Karlsruher SC and FSV Frankfurt defeated SC Paderborn.Some Bundesliga clubs had their work cut out and only reached the next round with little to spare. VfB Stuttgart narrowly won 2-1 in SV Babelsberg 03 and FSV Mainz 05 came out on top by the same result at Berliner AK 07. Another club to only scrape through was SC Freiburg who overcame FC Oberneuland 1-0.

The second round will be held on 26/27 October. The 32-team draw will take place on 21 August in the evening following the Bundesliga headliner Hamburg vs Schalke.

Shortly after playing for his national team - 2-2 against Denmark - , Christian Gentner and VfB Stuttgart had to battle hard in the DFB Cup when winning 2-1 in Babelsberg. (Photo: Firo/Augenklick)